The Blog of International Judicial Assistance | By Ted Folkman of Pierce Bainbridge

Posts tagged “SPEECH Act”

The case of the day is EFF v. Global Equity Management (SA) Pty Ltd., (N.D. Cal. 2017). No, you are not experiencing déjà vu— this is the same case we saw on Wednesday. As you will recall, Global Equity had gotten an injunction against the Electronic Frontier Foundation in a South Australian court requiring EFF to remove a supposedly defamatory post from EFF’s “Stupid Patent of the Month” section on its website. EFF had defaulted in the Australian case, and it then brought an action in San Francisco seeking a declaration that the injunction would be unenforceable in the United States in light of the SPEECH Act. In the decision I covered on Wednesday, a magistrate judge held that the court lacked personal jurisdiction…

The case of the day is Electronic Frontier Foundation v. Global Equity Management (SA) Pty Ltd. (N.D. Cal. 2017). EFF publishes “Stupid Patent of the Month” articles on its website, focusing its fire on what it says are questionable patents used to stifle innovation. Global Equity was the owner of a US patent that drew EFF’s fire. Global Equity, an Australian company, accused EFF of defamation and sued in the Supreme Court of South Australia. EFF did not appear in the case, and the South Australian court entered an injunction requiring EFF to remove the supposedly defamatory post from the internet. EFF then brought an action against Global Equity in California, seeking a declaration that the Australian injunction is unenforceable in the United States…

The case of the day is Handshoe v. Perret (S.D. Miss. 2017). The case is related to Trout Point Lodge Ltd. v. Handshoe, 729 F.3d 481 (5th Cir. 2013), the first appellate decision on the SPEECH Act. We haven’t seen the Act in a while, so just as a reminder, the purpose of the Act is to curb “libel tourism” by providing that US courts cannot recognize foreign defamation judgment if the foreign law does not provide the same protections for free speech as a US court would.